The deadline for the New York Rangers to submit their protected list for the Seattle expansion draft is Saturday at 5pm with a freeze on any trades beginning at 3pm. After 3pm, only the Kraken can make trades leading up to the expansion draft on Wednesday, July 21 at 8pm.
So far, Chris Drury and the Rangers have been quiet when it comes to making any deals. There have been relatively few trades, but expect that to change on Saturday as we near the deadline. Here’s what has been going on.
Gauthier signs
Restricted Free Agent Julien Gauthier signed a one year contract on Friday, giving him an NHL salary of $775k with it dropping to $300k if he is in the minor leagues. There is still a question of which forward will be exposed in the draft of there are no deals.
While the Rangers are definitely going to protect Mika Zibanejad, Artemi Panarin, Chris Kreider, Pavel Buchnevich, Filip Chytil and Ryan Strome, they can only protect one more of Gauthier, Brett Howden, Colin Blackwell and Kevin Rooney.
The team needs to expose two forwards under contract who have played 40 games in 2021 or 70 games the last two seasons. With his deal, Gauthier fulfills the minimum requirement along with Rooney, Howden and Blackwell.What does it mean? It could mean that Drury is looking at including one of the four in a pre-expansion deal. If they protect Rooney or Blackwell and end up trading Howden or Gauthier, they would still have the two forwards who have met the requirements.
When it comes to expansion, it’s worth remembering that Kraken General Manager Ron Francis was the GM when the Hurricanes picked Gauthier in the first round of the NHL Entry Draft in 2016. He was long gone when Gauther was traded to the Rangers last season.